OneSoulLegion's page

wait, i think they might have kept the enchanted dagger, and didn't count it as party treasure to be sold and divvied up.

anyway, the cleric already has an enchanted weapon, which leaves the rogue and the paladin to get theirs. The wizard can just zorch the wraiths with magic missile.

where the heck are ghost salts found?! I have the ultimate equipment book and there was never anything like that in there!

Ghost Salts are a Weapon Blanch from the Pathfinder Society Field Guide.

Since I'm getting tired of arguing this point, I figured I'd post it and see if I can get a consensus and/or official ruling.

Aspect of the Falcon (or the bracers with the same effect) gives crossbows and bows a crit range of 19-20 and a crit multiplier of x3, and specifically states that the effects of the spell will not stack with effects that increase your crit range, like Improved Critical.

However, a friend keeps arguing that if you have a crossbow, you can still use Improved Critical, because it's not STACKING, it's OVERLAPPING.

His argument is that the crossbow will have two crit ranges, 17-20 x2 and 19-20 x3, both active at the same time. So that if you crit on a 19-20 it'll give you x3, and if you crit on a 17-18 it'll give you a x2.

My argument is that a) the spell specifically states that it doesn't stack, and b) there's no provision in the Pathfinder rules anywhere for a single attack roll to have more than one crit range.

Opinions?

At the very least I'd not consider it masterwork weapons, just because a spoon is a masterowrk spoon doesnt mean you get +1 to hit with it.

Agreed. The tricky part rules-wise though is that items made from mithral or adamantine are always considered masterwork.

But honestly, unless a GM specifically tells me to do it otherwise, I'll just treat them as regular non-masterwork non-special material gauntlets if I attack with them.

I'm really wanting to say no, as adamantine gauntlets would/should be another 6,000gp, which obviously is not the case. The armor says it comes with gauntlets, not silver/admantine/mithral gauntlets, so that's all you get.

Yeah, that's pretty much what I'd want to say as well, I just wanted to run it past the crowd so I wasn't "handicapping myself" against the general concensus.

Overall, the gauntlets will probably still be made of the right material, just not in a way that specifically benefits attacking.

Efficient Quiver says you can retrieve items from it as fast as you could from a standard quiver or scabbard. Just how fast is that? Is it a free action?

On the same note, can you put an item into the Efficient Quiver at the same speed?

Overall, it depends. If drawing ammunition from it, that is indeed a free action. Drawing another weapon (like a staff, javelin or bow) as if from a scabbard is a move action. However, a weapon may be drawn as part of another move action if you have at least a +1 Base Attack Bonus.

Also, if you rule that you can store non-weapons in the quiver, those would likely need a move action as well.

Putting things into the quiver is likely a move action, just like putting things in any other bag or non-magical quiver.

A topic came up in passing when one of my characters was buying new armour, and I'm not sure what the official ruling would be, so I figured I'll see if anyone knows:

If you get a suit of armour that includes gauntlets, and it's made from a special material like Adamantine or Mithral, it would make sense for the gauntlets to be made of the same material. But does that really mean that the (free) gauntlets get all the benefits of being made of the new material, such as being inherently masterwork (in case of both adamantine and mithral), counting as material for overcoming damage reduction, and in the case of adamantine also overcoming hardness.

Just using narrative logic, that seems to be the case. But the numbercruncher in me feels like it might be a bit too much of a mechanical benefit, so I wanted to see what people think.

As far as i can see its normal equipment from the ISWG and thus on the always available list. It isn't a named magical armor like Rhino hide, its a type of armor no different than Plate, scale, or chain, and thus can be upgraded.

You are however giving your DM free reign to give you a hard time if you wear it without some sort of entitlement to it.

I agree it can be upgraded to be magical. The clarification I made in my OP is that you can't buy a suit of Masterwork Full Plate and then later pay the 350gp difference to "upgrade" it to Hellknight Plate, since that'd be like upgrading a breastplate to full plate.

And definitely for RP reasons, without being a member of a hell knight order you'd get into trouble for wearing the armour. But if you are a Hell Knight, by PrC or PP Award, that's different.

I have a character who is considering going into a Hellknight order.

Looking at Hellknight Plate, it's essentially the same as slightly more expensive Masterwork Full Plate until you gain the hellknight armour training, but I was wondering just when you are allowed to buy and start using Hellknight Plate, by the rules (treating it as full plate until you get the armour training).

First of all, since the armour has a different name but isn't a (named) magic item, I'll assume that you can't upgrade a suit of full plate to hellknight plate. You'd have to sell your old armour and buy a new suit.

I assume only Hellknights should wear it, but would you qualify for that when?

* You get your first level in Hellknight?

* If you pick up the Armiger or Hellknight Prestige awards as a member of the Cheliax faction - as Armiger you are officially a member of an order, if only honorary, and as such do you qualify for wearing the armour?

* Something else?

Well, you could argue that qualifying for feats is a limitation.

Thod: About the list of spells you listed above. Since it can easily be assumed that there can be weeks or months between PFS scenarios, I think the only spells that could even be considered relevant to the discussion are instantaneous spells with lasting effects and permanent spells. Any spells with days/level could easily be assumed to have ended since you could simply assume more than that has gone by.

Thod:

First of all, sorry if my previous post was a little badly written. Mobile phones and all... =)

Secondly, I agree that not all instant spells would be included (like raise dead, healing spells, and so forth), ruling it as such feels like playing the devil's avocado (delicious but wrong!). But that is just the problem, the rule as is really isn't clearly written enough, as can be seen by the various arguments (also look up the discussions about Masterwork Transformation, another instantaneous spell).

Or rather, the rule as written would allow spells cast by an NPC to persist and thereby cause less trouble, but there are also many people who say that this is not RAI. So no matter what, the rule simply doesn't seem clear enough.

Currently, the rule is divided into two parts.
One of them is very clear: Three spells are expressly banned - reincarnate, permanency and awaken. These can NEVER be used in any way in PFS.
The second part is the one that has gotten all the kerfuffle about it - it states that any spells cast by a PC will end when the scenario ends, even if they have instantaneous or permanent duration.

The unclear part is really connected to that "by a PC" part, as far as I can see (there are also those who argue that the ruling as a whole could do with being changed, but that's beside the point for the moment). Since the spells are clearly not banned (if they were, they'd be covered by the first rule), then what is the purpose of this?

Is it reduced book keeping? If so, why have that "by a PC" as part of the rules text?
Is it a case of monetary balance? If so, the "by a PC" would make sense - the spells are still available freely to anyone who can pay for the spellcasting services, and everyone pays the same amount. It just means that players can't do it themselves (or have other party members do it) to save on the spellcasting services fee (spell level * caster level * 10gp)

As for a solution - the problem with that is that I simply don't know the designers' intent. The best solution I could find is to post about it, mark as a FAQ candidate, and hope to get official word from Paizo on this.

Thod: I would be fine with that ruling as a necessary evil.
The problem, though, is that this is not what the PFS rules say. The current rules (4.1) say that all spells end, even if instantaneous or permanent, if they are cast by a PC.

As such, no matter what the official ruling ends up, it needs to be written more clearly.

I would say it works, but with a caveat. Since you are animating it as an object rather than as a corpse, it wouldn't be infused with the same type of energy as an unread. As such, things like rigor mortis could be an issue, and I expect it'd move more like a marionette without fine control.

I'm certainly not an expert, but my understanding has always been that the intent was to rule out any non-standard magic items. That is consistent with no crafting, no Permanency, no re-skinning of animal companions, etc. Stick to what's n the book. As cool as character development and RPing is, society play demands a fair amount of conformity to a narrower set of option just because a smidge of variation taken by tens of thousands of players creates havoc. But, again, not an expert opinion.

I agree with you on the principle of non-standard magic items, though I don't really see how that would apply for this - why even have a separate ruling and not just ban continual flame etc in the first rule?

Anything that would be a useful magic item is already covered by the Permanency ban as far as I can tell.

actually what the NPC is doing is making you a magic item. It is basically made the exact same as the everburning torch--just a different shape. he is not casting continual flame on you--but on an object. an NPC casting water breathing on you and making it permanent should be illegal---making the item should not.

That's basically what I'm trying to get a clarification on. =)

And making water breathing permanent would definitely be illegal under PFS rules, due to this ruling:

The following spells found in the Core Rulebook are not legal for play and may never be used, found, purchased, or learned in any form by PCs playing Pathfinder Society scenarios: awaken, permanency, and reincarnate.

As you see, spells like Permanency and Reincarnate are completely banned and cannot be used by the PCs no matter what. What I'm trying to get a clarification on is the rule in the next paragraph, which states that any spell cast by a PC during the course of a scenario ends with the scenario, even if instantaneous and permanent, giving continual flame as one of the examples.

It's that "cast by a PC" that seems to be the source of confusion, I suppose.

Currently, you *can* have an NPC cast a spell and have it last. However, the campaign managers have asked that you not do this, as it is a loophole they intend to close in the next edition of the guide to organized play.

Just out of curiosity, do you have a source on this? The last things I found on it was from September or so of last year (and inconclusive, to be honest), and it wasn't changed in the 4.1 guide in January which would make sense if it was slated to change back in September.

Part of the reason the spells end is because there is no tracking of the passage of time between scenarios, even if those scenarios take place in completely different parts of the world. So if this rule did not exist, it would possible to cast a spell at the end of one scenario that would still be active at the start of the next. As for spells that create something permanent without the need to buy the item, those end, probably, so that the wealth balance is not thrown off. Why should a caster be able to make a bunch of free magic torches, while a non-caster has to spend gold for the same thing?

I'm aware of this. If you read the original post carefully, I was talking about the spell being cast by an NPC, since the rule about permanent/instant spells in the PFS guide specifically calls out spells being cast by a PC.

Also, technically the magic torches wouldn't be free for the caster either - it costs 50gp of material components if you cast it yourself, and 110gp if you have an NPC cast it for you (the 50gp for materials, and 10*2*3gp to have a second level spell cast by a third level caster).

110gp also happens to be the exact cost of an ever burning torch, which really is just a stick with the spell cast on it, and that doesn't run out at the end of the scenario either.

If the item in question is a weapon, remember that

Magic Items wrote:

Light Generation: Fully 30% of magic weapons shed light equivalent to a light spell. These glowing weapons are quite obviously magical. Such a weapon can't be concealed when drawn, nor can its light be shut off. Some of the specific weapons detailed below always or never glow, as defined in their descriptions.

Just say that your weapon glows like 30% of weapons and describe it as flickering with holy/unholy/arcane licks of flame. The only mechanical difference that I can think of is that it would not illuminate magical darkness. Even in PFS, there are ways to get the flavor that you want.

Sadly, the item in question isn't a weapon, so I'm out of luck for that. =/

To be honest, I don't care one bit about it dispelling magical darkness, it's entirely a visual/flavour deal.

Well, if you can't then you can't, and I'd just have to find some other game before I could play this particular character since it wouldn't work in PFS.

What bothers me is really that it's so unclear. By the specific wording of the rules as written, I see nothing that prohibits it since the rule specifically calls out the player character casting the spells.

But I can also see how it might just be unclearly written, so honestly I'd like to just see the rules written more clearly and given an official answer so it's not something that has to be decided by each individual GM.

I've seen a fair bit of discussion on this, and even talk back and forth with both sides claiming RAI, so I'm hoping to get some clarification.

The current PFS guide (4.1 at the time of writing), on page 20, states the following:

"Any spell cast by a PC during the course of a scenario
that is still active at the end of a scenario ends when
the scenario does."

I'm assuming that the main reason for this is because otherwise a player wizard with such spells could cast them on other pathfinders for just the material cost (or on his own gear), and thereby saving a (possibly unfair) amount of gold.

I actually didn't give this any real thought until I was working on a new player character - as a flavour item, this character wants an item with a continual flame spell cast on it. Would the "by a PC" in the above rule mean that I could pay for the normal NPC spellcasting services once to get this item done (since it's not torch-shaped and as such cannot legally be an ever-burning torch, nor is it in orbit, so it can't be an ioun stone), or would I essentially be forced to pay the 110gp to have the spell cast at the start of each and every scenario that I play?

If it's the latter, I think the guide needs to update its wording since the rule specifically calls out spells cast by player characters (something that I only noticed today when double checking it for my new character).

"You know what they say: 'To save the world, you have to push a few old ladies down the stairs.'" - Bernard, Day of the Tentacle

I was curious, is it possible to make, for example, a darkwood spear with a cold iron or mithral spearhead?

Main reason I'm asking is that spears definitely qualifies for being made from darkwood (it's a weapon made mostly from wood), but I haven't found any rules talking about having more than one material, whether allowing or disallowing.

As I figure it, a darkwood spear with a cold iron spearhead would be priced as per both rules (double the base cost of the spear to 4gp, add 300gp for being masterwork and 60gp for being made of darkwood (as a normal spear weighs 6 lbs). It would then be a masterwork spear weighing 3 lbs, counting as cold iron for overcoming DR, and costing an extra 2000 GP to enchant due to being cold iron.

Is this correct? It's hardly optimal by any stretch, but it fits a character concept so I wanted to make sure it was legal since I already purchased it for my PFS character (and otherwise I'll have to refund the 2gp for Cold Iron).

I think that a CC using DD with a weapon is probably against "rules as intended" but I suspect the wording does not rule this out and it's not *that* great so as a GM I would probably accept it.

The only reason I figured it'd be usable normally rather than being a fully separate ability is in the wording of the Braggart ability, which states "You gain Dazzling Display as a bonus feat". If it was completely separate, they could just have given the ability the same mechanics (since DD already has the same mechanics as demoralizing via Intimidate).

Anyway, thanks everyone for the replies. Feels like my reading of it is the same as most of you. I think honestly the ambiguous wording could easily enough be fixed by changing "wielding the weapon in which you have Weapon Focus" to "wielding a weapon in which you have Weapon Focus".

I'm wondering about a specific ruling of Dazzling Display, due to the wording of the feat.

Feats where you need to select a specific weapon or skill to work with it generally say so in the feat itself, such as Weapon Focus having the following text:
"Choose one type of weapon. You can also choose unarmed strike or grapple (or ray, if you are a spellcaster) as your weapon for the purposes of this feat."

Weapon Focus can also be chosen more than once, if you want to focus on multiple weapons.

Dazzling Display on the other hand doesn't, but it does have the same "proficiency with the selected weapon" prerequisite that Weapon Focus does. Apart from that, it merely states "While wielding the weapon in which you have Weapon Focus(...)"

So, if someone happens to have more than one Weapon Focus, do you still ony take Dazzling Display once, and able to use the feat with any weapon that you have weapon focus in?

If yes, would that also mean that a Cockatrice Cavalier (who gets DD as a bonus feat from their Braggart ability) who has Weapon Focus could also choose to use it with a weapon if they so choose (as a full-round action, rather than the Braggart standard action)?

Adam Daigle wrote:

David Devier wrote:

One thing I have going for me is the fact that I'm single and can still move everything I own in an SUV with a small trailer. But I definitely think I could maybe manage the move in.. 2-3 months, if I economize. We shall see what the future holds. Someone get out the Harrow deck!

edited because I missed an I in there and it looked silly.

The good thing about a food background is that you can be dropped blindfolded pretty much anywhere in the world, and if you're good enough with basic cooking skills and pantomime, you can get a gig where you can make a living within a week. I say this as a guy who worked kitchens for a dozen years. Portable skills are good skills.

That just happens to be what I'm going to be studying.

Pantomime?

Michael Brock wrote:

I'll make sure the wording is added in Guide 4.1. I'm not sure why it doesn't appear in 4.0. I wish people didn't need to feel they had to "win" or game the system but I understand it is the nature of the beast. *sigh*

It will read as follows:

"Neither the craft feats nor the item creation section of the magic items chapter in the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook are legal for play. Additionally, except for day job rolls, the Craft skill is not legal for play and crafting of mundane items is not allowed in Pathfinder Society. One exception is alchemist are allowed to use the craft skill per the FAQ."

IMO crafting enhances role playing greatly. Why is it not allowed? I have on character who draws, one who carves wood, one who writes stories. Why is one character allowed to use his skill (Profession) to cook a meal, while another is not allowed to use a craft skill to paint a nice picture?

At a wild guess, probably because with the unknown amounts of downtime you have in PFS (since every scenario tends to be stand-alone, making the "campaign" episodic in nature), it'd risk skewing the wealth curve considerably.

Hi,

I am wondering if there is a PFS in Stockholm and if not if there would be any people interested in joining/running one?

Cheers!
Mayu

I don't know of one, unfortunately. But I know of at least me and one more player in the area who usually game online at the moment (and even that is usually hard with time zones), so you'd have some interest at least. =)

DΗ wrote:

I like the setting.

I do agree that some of the rules changes are things I'm less keen on. Mostly when they "fixed" something that wasn't broken.

But then, I think that undershooting the powercurve is nearly as bad as overshooting it (yes, in some cases we can just pretend the option doesn't exist, but it slows down time looking for usable options, misleads new players who dont have a sense of where the power curve is for each level, and is a waste of space in the book), and the paizo devs disagree with me on that.

Example: Cleave (Pathfinder version, as opposed to the non-stellar, but acceptable 3.5e version).

You mean the current Cleave that the fighter uses in my party to great and deadly effect?

And Cleaving Finish, if you prefer the 3.5 version of Cleave...

I don't feel these two should be allowed to work together. I don't think Weapon Focus should work with Ranged weapons because of Point Blank Shot.

A Full BAB Fighter gets Weapon Focus and his +1 BAB.

A Full BAB Archer gets Weapon Focus, his +1 BAB AND Point Blank??

Plus the Archer gets to stay 30 feet from the combat while the Fighter has to stand toe-to-toe in melee.

Anything I'm missing?

Fighters can also get bonuses that the archer doesn't, like that +2 flanking bonus, not having to spend another feat to attack the same person as their friends without a -4 penalty, and so forth.

Are there any Organized Play-approved traits or feats, that would be available to a Half-Elf from Andoran, that can grant Linguistics as a class skill? I'm fiddling around with the idea of a Gunslinger/Inquisitor who echoes Atticus Finch, including the attourney angle.

You could take Cosmopolitan - aside from giving you two free languages, it also lets you pick two INT, WIS or CHA based skills as class skills. In your case, it could be Linguistics and one more skill useful for an attorney like Diplomacy or Sense Motive.

One of the best examples of appropriate tools to damage objects I've read was from an article about armour for a completely different game. It gave the following scenario:

Imagine you have a tree, about a foot in diameter (it's not a very old tree, but yeah). If a strong warrior with a greatsword took a swing at it, he could probably fell the tree in a few swings, at most.

Now, take the exact same kind of wood, and build a sturdy fence/wall from planks. Then take a swing at it with the same greatsword... more likely than not, you've put a couple of small chips into it, despite the fact that the wall is in fact thinner than the tree was.

This is because of the relative shapes of a tree vs a wall - with a sword, you have a lot more difficulty getting a useful angle of attack attacking a flat surface, compared to a cylindrical pillar.

I also see this as the main reason some large monsters (like say, a dragon) can have such high armour class - the difficulty isn't in HITTING the damn thing, but rather to hit it in such a way that it does something meaningful and doesn't just glance off. With the D&D/Pathfinder version of armour class (where armour makes it harder to hit rather than reducing damage) it's even more so, but even in systems where hitting and getting through armour are separate mechanics it's valid - a "miss" isn't necessarily a complete whiff, it can connect. It just can't connect meaningfully...

No need to argue, find your book and read the item description, it's pretty straight forward (hint it's changed since 3.5 and you are wrong).

An amulet of mighty fists does not need to have a +1 enhancement bonus to grant a melee weapon special ability.

That'll teach me to not check the PRD first when posting away from home... =)

At the risk of being deleted

** spoiler omitted **

That's not how you wear a Cestus.

As a slight addendum, unless the mighty fist amulet creation rules has specific exceptions, you cannot craft a +0 "weapon" with an ability - you need to make it +1 before you can add an ability like ghost touch.

I'd think it applies to the Amulet of Mighty Fists just like it applies to magical weapons and armour, but I'd be willing to listen to opposing arguments. =)

Sounds like most of the consensus (including the info quoted from JJ) is what I figured and how I'd personally run it - it's essentially a longsword that if you have the proficiency gets reduced penalties for TWF since they're designed for a two-weapon fighting style.

Also @Diego - what I meant by Conditional finesse was that the weapon with the old ruling is only finessable if you also have the exotic proficiency, but not when used as a martial weapon. Regardless, the point seems moot). Also, if the intent (RAI) of the weapon was that it was to be finessable, they'd probably just have labeled it as a finesse weapon as they have with some other non-light ones already.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback, and now I know that I can happily design the NPC the way I had in mind without worrying too much about rule mishaps.

Also, for the example given with a +2 modifier, 1.5*2 = 3, not 3.5, so in that case there is no rounding going on.

But yeah, as a general rule round down unless a specific rule tells you otherwise.

I've been considering making a character that would use one or two sawtooth sabres, and I've been a little confused on the contradictory rules for it. I posted this question over on the PFS section, but they suggested I post over here.

Basically, there seems to be (at least) two different rules for how the Sawtooth Sabre works:

Adventurer's Armory: The Sawtooth Sabre is a longsword, unless you have EWP: Sawtooth Sabre. If you do, then it is treated as a light weapon.

Inner Sea World Guide: The Sawtooth Sabre, if you are proficient, counts as a light weapon purely for the purposes of two-weapon fighting penalties. In all other respects, it is treated as a regular one-handed weapon and has stats like that of a longsword.

Usually, I'd assume that the latest printed rule applies - where this gets confusing is that the AA rules were written before the World Guide, but then reprinted (updated AA) after it, unless I have my chronology mixed up.

Going by what is simplest, I'd favour the ISWG ruling, because it opens less weird logic holes - such as, with the AA version you can get a higher damage bonus for wielding the sabre two-handed if you aren't trained in using one, but once you get the training, the weapon is light and no longer qualifies, meaning that for two-handed single-weapon fighting, getting training in how to use the weapon actually makes it less effective. Also, the AA version opens up odd cases like conditional Weapon Finesse (which the World Guide never allows it to be finessed, I believe) and the like.

In a home game, the group (and GM) can naturally decide which rules they prefer, but the reason I originally posted it in the PFS section was that it'd be nice to get an official ruling for PFS and other pickup games.

So... opinions?

Sorry 'bout the borderline necromancy, just wanted to weigh in and say that this looks completely awesome. Will definitely do something like this if I manage to get hold of some boxes...

I haven't found any information on this while searching, so apologies if it has been answered/clarified somewhere and I'm just blind:

I'm considering making a character who uses sawtooth sabres, and in looking up the weapon I've noticed that it has two different sets of rules from two different sources - the Inner Sea World Guide and the Adventurer's Armory. Which of those (or which mix of them) is it that is used in PFS organized play? I'm thinking because which feats etc work with the weapon depends on the ruling - the Inner Sea version (IIRC) only counts the weapon as light for the purposes of two-weapon fighting, which would allow you to use it two-handed if you wanted (since it's not a light weapon), but wouldn't allow you to use weapon finesse. The Adventurer's Armory version states that the weapon is light if you have the EWP which would mean that you can Finesse it, but not use it as a two-hander (since you can't get the benefits of using a two-handed weapon with light weapons).

People have given some pretty good answers, I'd just like to address one specific subpoint of question 3:

"They don't have the option of fleeing from a battle, do they?"

Essentially, they have the option to try anything they want to. If someone wants to spend their action in combat doing a little dance, you might look at them funny and ask if they're sure, but they can do it. =)

So if the party thinks they're in over their heads in a combat, they definitely have the option to attempt to flee. If they want to take their fallen comrade(s) with them, they'll have to specifically do that (as in, get to the body and pick it up or drag it with them). Also, depending on what they are fighting, they might well be pursued.

It's all really quite free-form. The players can attempt anything, and you as the GM just have to figure out if it seems possible. As you gain more experience and confidence as a GM (It's really scary when just starting out, as any GM can tell you =) ), you'll get better at this. But basically remember that you're all there to have fun, and try to get into the minds of your monsters.

For example - if they get into a fight with the goblin king and his minions, things go south (but no one drops) and they decide to run, you might decide that the goblins go back to bickering among themselves, and the king is happy enough having shown how big and scary he is by chasing the big armed people away.

If that happens, just remember that this isn't a video game. If that happens, and the characters then come back to the same place, in virtually all cases if whatever monster is still there, they'll remember what happened last time. And if the players take time off to rest, so can the monsters in the same time. It's one of those things where you just have to improvise "what seems right".

I believe they are three-quarterlings as you have a full human and a halfling.

That only works if you assume that a halfling means "half-human". If you go by the half-elf/half-orc/half-fiend/etc naming template, it would be a half-halfling, thus a quarterling.

And since humans seem to always be implied it this, I suppose that would imply that humans are easy.

Don't forget the quarterlings!

To add the whole "official NPC/Iconics" list...

It's not really a spoiler in any way, but just in case someone is utterly allergic to any mention of an npc present at the very start of an AP, I'll put it in tags:

There's another aspect of the wizard that hasn't really been mentoined above - the opportunity to find an old scroll/tome/tablet/whatnot with a rare or powerful spell.

If we didn't have the spellbook system, how would you have that work? If every wizard simply knew every spell as soon as they hit the right level.

(since I assume you'd still want the wizard to be versatile to keep it separate from the sorcerer who has a set limit of spells known but no need to prepare)

(I'm also assuming here that not every campaign gives a wizard a nice local magic store/wizard's university/whatever with a 100% free reign of picking and choosing whatever spells they want with no restrictions. Sometimes, a campaign doesn't really work like that)

Basically, it has to do with the Poisoner archetype not being a traps specialist the way basic rogues are.

While poison use doesn't scale in the same way that trapfinding does it scale in a way since being higher level means access to better poisons.

Losing Trap Sense altogether means you won't pick it up at level 6. And Master Poisoner does scale with level, meaning it's not stagnant as you say.

Bottom line is that a poisoner is a rogue that's focused on poisons rather than being a generalist, and doing so he or she has spent less time learning about traps. If you plan on being the person in the group dealing with traps, then this archetype probably isn't for you.

Oh, and unfortunately I haven't seen any poisoners in my group yet. I imagine they do quite well in games that aren't very traps-heavy, or games where you have other ways of dealing with traps (such as having another rogue or urban ranger in the party)

This is one place where sorcerer bloodlines - my favorite new part of Pathfinder from 3.5 - disappointed me. I really like playing up the idea of "sorcerers as mutations/freaks" and having a bloodline that changes them physically is a great way to do that.

Still, the existing bloodlines usually tend to have some physical changes in them somewhere, so it's not a total loss on that front.

To be honest, I'm glad they didn't put that down in detailed rules. Sorcerers are very much individuals, and some of the bloodlines are even fairly broad. I doubt two abyssal sorcerers would show the same trait. Or two fey sorcerers. Or two abherrant sorcerers especially.

It's your character - just be creative with it, and if you have any ideas that are really out there, run them by your GM first if you want to be on the safe side.

If you want to avoid AoO for firing the crossbow in melee as well, there's another feat in the APG called Point Blank Master that allows exactly that for one ranged weapon, though it's only available to fighters (weapon specialization is a prerequisite) and archery rangers (who can take it as a combat style feat).

Definitely... also, as the GM, try to figure out the logic and logistics behind the area (will the creatures living there be passing through, are there a lot of wild animals in the area, and so on and so forth) as well as what the PCs do to make a camp site (in a dungeon for example, are they just making a camp in some random room, or are they barricading the room they're in properly so that it'd be hard (and noisy) to get in for a random passer-by, etc.

Of course, you can also decide to be nice to them, but ultimately it should be a mix of a) what makes sense for the situation, b) what makes sense for dramatics and most importantly c) what's the most fun.

In the end, a dungeon where it's always safe to curl up in any corner and sleep isn't very exciting (unless it's the kind of old tomb with nothing alive inside unless you trigger the trap, in which case the emptyness and lack of life becomes part of the atmosphere), but on the other hand NEVER getting a full night's sleep because the party is ceaselessly hounded by various nasties isn't very fun, and also isn't very likely unless they've done something very stupid to annoy the local populace and/or are stupid about their choice of camping spots.

Awww... that looks adorable.

Ok so I understand how multiclassing works. However does taking a prestige class work the same way? If your sorc takes a lvl in dragon desciple does he no longer get the +1hp or sp per lvl?

This is correct - Dragon Disciple is the class you are levelling in, and it's not your favoured class (most likely for a sorc/disciple, Sorcerer is). So while you are levelling as a Dragon Disciple you will not get your favoured class bonus every time you level up.

Also note that your favoured class can never be a prestige class.